Unformatted Document Text:
participate. Three students declined participation and have, consequently, not been included the
material.
On the day that the memory work was to be carried out, the students came to class with their
stories already written. As they had previously been divided into groups, the process of working
with the stories could begin fairly promptly. First, the stories were read aloud one by one. After
this, the students freely associated, describing their thoughts and feelings in relation to each
other’s stories. In the teachers memoranda (written shortly after the seminar) this first round of
readings and association is described as extremely creative and exciting. The stories themselves
were experienced as very “good”, compelling and emotionally strong. After a short break, the
second phase began; the stories were to be compared to one another and similarities and
differences between them pinpointed. At this point in the working process, the stories are to be
regarded as texts, as an empirical material that is to be interpreted, and not as accounts of
something that has actually happened. This phase was more difficult. The teachers describe how
the discussions got stuck and how the memory stories tended to get lost in discussions of “how
things really are”. Finally, in the third phase of interpretation, the stories were to be analysed and
positioned in relation to the theoretical texts. The teachers describe this phase as clearly the most
troublesome. The students did not really seem to grasp what they were expected to do and turned
to the teachers for guidance.
The following day the other half of the students dealt with the issue of gender and nation and the
same course literature. While the assignment encompassed the same three interpretative steps,
these students worked with the more conventional empirical material in the handout mentioned
above. Here the teachers comment that the different groups worked with the material in very
8

Authors: Wendt, Maria. and Åse, Cecilia.

Page 8 of 23

participate. Three students declined participation and have, consequently, not been included the

material.

On the day that the memory work was to be carried out, the students came to class with their

stories already written. As they had previously been divided into groups, the process of working

with the stories could begin fairly promptly. First, the stories were read aloud one by one. After

this, the students freely associated, describing their thoughts and feelings in relation to each

other’s stories. In the teachers memoranda (written shortly after the seminar) this first round of

readings and association is described as extremely creative and exciting. The stories themselves

were experienced as very “good”, compelling and emotionally strong. After a short break, the

second phase began; the stories were to be compared to one another and similarities and

differences between them pinpointed. At this point in the working process, the stories are to be

regarded as texts, as an empirical material that is to be interpreted, and not as accounts of

something that has actually happened. This phase was more difficult. The teachers describe how

the discussions got stuck and how the memory stories tended to get lost in discussions of “how

things really are”. Finally, in the third phase of interpretation, the stories were to be analysed and

positioned in relation to the theoretical texts. The teachers describe this phase as clearly the most

troublesome. The students did not really seem to grasp what they were expected to do and turned

to the teachers for guidance.

The following day the other half of the students dealt with the issue of gender and nation and the

same course literature. While the assignment encompassed the same three interpretative steps,

these students worked with the more conventional empirical material in the handout mentioned

above. Here the teachers comment that the different groups worked with the material in very